


Psychological Testing

by Evilawyer



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-01-10
Updated: 2008-01-10
Packaged: 2017-12-23 10:22:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/925236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Evilawyer/pseuds/Evilawyer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor does testing on the Master.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Psychological Testing

“Please,” begged the Doctor.

“No,” said the Master. The Doctor had been begging for hours, and the Master found that it wasn't nearly as pleasant as he'd always thought it would be. Too whiny. 

“Please. I'm asking you properly now. Just do this.”

“No. I'm not letting you treat me like some rat in a maze. I refuse.”

“It's just psychological testing. It'll help with the drums. If I can just diagnose your psychological problems, I'll know what's wrong with you and be able to help you.”

“I have no 'psychological problems', thank you. And whatever happened to 'I know you'? Not so sure that you've got a good read on me and my motivations after all, then?”

“I didn't say that. But I need to dig into the nuances of your mind if I'm to actually figure out what to do with you.”

“What you can do with me is release me.”

“I can't do that. Who knows what horrors you'd inflict on the universe out of the sheer perversion you harbor in the deepest, darkest recesses of your psyche?”

“You just want to be able to say that I've got an unresolved Oedipal complex or some such sex-related Freudian garbage,” the Master grumbled.

“Please,” said the Doctor in an offended tone. “Freud may still be relevant, but there've been so many in-roads made in psychological analysis and treatment since his day. Some even say he's passe. No, I want to help you. I really do.” The Doctor's voice became wistful. “I want us to be pals again. I'd like that. Just the two of us against the cosmos. I want it to be like when we were at school together. ”

The Master contemplated the heartfelt sincerity in the Doctor's tone before he responded. “You mean...you want it to be like when you laughed while the bigger boys beat the snot out of me on the playground and I got back at you by filling your science project volcano with dog crap and it exploded and got all over Borusa's ceremonial headdress?”

“Um, yeah?”

The Master's eyes took on a dreamy, reminiscent cast. “Ah, happy school days. I'm coming over all nostalgic.” He sniffed as he wiped a small tear from his eye. “What the hell. Bring on the tests, Doctor.”

**************

“Now,” the Doctor said as he sat down across from the Master, perched his glasses on his nose and picked up a card. “What does the image on this card look like to you?”

“An inkblot.”

The Doctor frowned and held up another card. “What about this card?”

“An inkblot.”

“What is it about the image that reminds you of an inkblot?”

“The fact that it's an inkblot.”

“No, no, no. You're being too literal,” the Doctor groused as he threw the card down on the table. “I can't see into your psyche unless you let your imagination run free.”

“You can see enough of my psyche to be able to tell that I can spot an inkblot when I see one. That proves I'm firmly rooted in reality and not at all sociopathic. Clearly, the only proper thing to do with a sane person like me is to let _me_ run free.”

“It may lend some small credence to a finding that your staring into the Untempered Schism didn't cause a complete break between your mind and reality and therefore I can say you're probably not psychotic. It says nothing about whether or not you're a sociopath and it fairly screams that you're defensive and therefore paranoid.”

The Master put his forearms on the table and leaned forward. “I've been the target of assassination plots, my own wife shot me, and a Time Lord with the hairdo and energy level of a wild porcupine on methamphetamine is keeping me against my will in an antiquated TARDIS. Why on Earth would I feel paranoid?”

“I didn't say you feel paranoid, I said you are paranoid. It's a subconscious thing. And, by the way, your sarcasm is a indicator of depression. And how long have you been seeing those porcupines? Because if you're having visual hallucinations along with hearing drums, I'm going to have to rethink my eliminating psychosis from your diagnosis.” A huge grin broke out on the Doctor's face. “Rhymes, that does!”

The Master contemplated the Doctor through narrowed eyes. “Subconscious. So, what now? You're going to tell me that I think my father didn't love me and my mother didn't breastfeed me long enough?”

“Oh, come on, now. The twisted workings of your tortured mind can't all be chalked up to whether your Dad spent enough time playing catch with you. The breastfeeding, though, that's a bit sad, actually. Explains a lot about you.”

“I knew it! I knew you were going to turn this into some weird, Freudian thing so that you can say I'm sexually repressed.”

“Not at all. It's just a shame you weren't breastfed. You didn't achieve good attachment, which in turn has lead you to be cut off from others. It's no wonder you're a depressed, paranoid sociopath.”

“I _was_ breastfed. Plenty. Long after I was on solid food, I still got all the breasty-snacks I wanted. For as long as I wanted them.” The Master slapped his palms onto his chest. “Mother's milk from mother's breasts.” With dramatic flare, the Master removed his hands from his chest and swept them, palms up, down the length of his torso like a game show hostess pointing out the fabulous prizes to the contestants while saying, “Not a sociopath.”

“Welllll...”

“What?”

“How old were you when you finally cut out the breasty-snacks?”

“I'm not talking to you anymore,” the Master huffed.

“No, it's just that breasty-snacks going on for too long can cause their own troubles.”

“You're just trying to pathologize me and I don't like it.”

“But you _are_ pathological. It's not like I'm doing it to you.”

“Don't be so sure. How would you like it if I insisted that you tell me how long you were breastfed?”

“...”

“Well, Doctor, how about it? How long?”

“I don't want to talk about it.”

“You weren't breastfed?” the Master guessed. Correctly. “Oh, Doctor, no wonder you're so emotionally detached. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.”

“Oi! I am not emotionally detached! I constantly hug people. Envelope them in great big bear hugs, I do.”

“Well, you do have a tendency to emote all over people. Perhaps you're not emotionally detached.”

“Thank you,” the Doctor said. He found it extremely gratifying when the Master admitted he was right. 

“But,” the Master continued ”you are sexually repressed.”

********

“This question is stupid,” complained the Master.

“It's an important indicator of how you see yourself in relation to others and your environment,” explained the Doctor.

“It makes no sense. It might as well be asking me if I can hear my pancreas.”

“No. It's just trying to find out if you have bizarre and excessive concerns about yourself.”

“Oh, so you're trying make me out to be a hypochondriac, then.”

“No, no. It's just trying to measure where you fall on the schizophrenia scale. Also maybe on the obsessive-compulsive scale.”

“Now you're calling me a hypochondriacal, obsessive-compulsive schizophrenic.”

“No! Although...”

“Make your next sentence good, Doctor. Get every little bit of joy out of it you can, because I'm feeling like I want to obsessively compulse you and I can always make another tissue compression eliminator, you know.”

“Well, you do have this tendency to wear a lot of black,” the Doctor said as he picked up the Master's arm by the cuff of his black suit jacket.

“I look good in black.” The Master snatched his cuff out of the Doctor's hand and folded his arms across his chest. “I'm a natty dresser. That's a psychological disorder now?”

“No, it's just, well, odd.” 

“Odd. Says the man with the white Converse All-Stars from the 1960s. They aren't even high-tops. And they have no arch support whatsoever. You'll do yourself an injury one of these days, all that running from alien invaders without proper arch support.”

“Maybe you are a bit hypochondriacal.”

“Maybe I'm just obsessed with your feet, Doctor. Have you thought of that?”

The Doctor turned beet red as he began gathering up the papers on the table. “Right. Yes. Well, I think we're done with this test, then.” 

“Doctor, are you blushing?”

“Blushing? No! I'm not blushing! Why would I be blushing? It's just a bit hot in here, don't you think?”

“Yup,” smirked the Master, smugly popping the “p”. “Sexually repressed, all right.” 

********

“So what's the diagnosis?” the Master asked in a bored tone as he entered the console room with a manila folder in his hand. 

“What?” The Doctor looked up from the scanner screen. “Oh, the testing. I decided that it wouldn't really help to know exactly what's wrong with you. It's nothing minor, whatever it is.”

“Didn't like the little peek into yourself it all provided?”

“What peek would that be?”

“That you're sexually repr....”

“Stop that! I am not sexually repressed.”

“Well, there is one way to prove that.”

“Prove? I'm not proving anything to you.”

“Chicken.”

“What!? Chicken!? I'm not chicken. It's just that I'm really, truly not physically attracted to you. It _is_ just the two of us and I _do_ care for you deeply, but I don't think of you that way.”

“Tsk, tsk, tsk, Doctor,” the Master shook his head reprovingly. “What did you think I was suggesting? I respect you far too much to pressure you into a physical liaison by calling your libido into question. This time, anyway. No, no, no. I had something much less intimate, shall we say, in mind.”

“Oh? Well...what?”

The Master pulled a card from the folder in his hand. “What does the image on this card look like to you?”

The End.


End file.
